After having a great time in El Cuyo, an epic drive on a narrow stretch of land with stunning views and visiting a laidback fishing village in the last post, we were convinced that there are more in Yucatan to explore and were ready to find more hidden gems.
The first stop on our way west on the northern coast of Yucatan was Merida! The first success was finding a cute camp spot in the heart of the city but in a lush green garden and in a quiet neighborhood in Merida where we could feel at nature where we are with the car and at the same time, we can take an uber to wherever we wanted in the city.
For the first day, we had a great day in Merida centro, exploring its mercado, local street food and have a much needed haircut for 4 dollars.
In Merida, we felt great to be back in real Mexico. Everything was familiar again, the smells, markets, fruits and of course the food!
But to be honest, we wanted some different food from a different cuisine after being in Mexico and Guatemala for over 3 months. While we were driving around Tulum, few days back, we found an Israeli vegan restaurant, only serving Humus and Falafel by accident and the food was so good!
So arriving in Merida, we decided to try our luck to see if we can find more Middle Eastern food around and we found a restaurant.
So for the second day in Merida, we headed there to try their food. And that was where we met Soroush! The funniest most talented Iranian chef in Merida where we expected the least. We instantly connected and he kindly invited us in the kitchen and cooked the best food that we had since we started this trip, for us. We felt at home and it was such a great surprise to find an iranian friend in Mexico.
After Merida, we had a short drive continuing west to reach the sea and a small town called Celestun which is located on a narrow stretch of land between the sea and some wetlands full of Flamingos when we arrived in January.
In the first glance, Celestun looked unreal. Little old town with cute old building and palm and coconut trees and a long stretch of sandy beach next to the town main street and almost no tourist around in January. The weather was just perfect too. We headed directly to a campsite that we had in mind and it was unreal too. A beautiful white sand everywhere with lots of coconut trees to provide right amount of shade, sea was few meters away and we had a pile of coconut under a tree next to our spot to use!
I can say after camping in Baja under the palm trees, this one was our best campsite of the trip so far.
And it wasn’t only the beautiful setting of the place, it was the people who ran the place and travellers who were camping next to us that made it a stay to remember for a long time.
We had a great stay for few days, made delicious food and had fresh coconut and watched epic sunsets at the beach.
The owners were originally fishermen and had a fishing business for big restaurants in Merida and Cancun.
And one of other travellers told us that we can ask them to bring fresh fish to grill. So for the last night, we asked them to bring us enough fish to feed 8 to 10 people and asked everyone to join for a campfire and grilled fish. I went shopping with a nice Canadian lady who was staying next to us and was there for over a month to get some fruit and vegetable for the party and by late afternoon, everything was ready for a feast.
Great food, great company, more than a few shots of Mescal and a beautiful sunset made a night that we won’t forget. Celestun stole our hearts and we could stay much longer if we didn’t have a deadline to meet.
From Celestun, we headed south to the beautiful Campeche on the western side of the peninsula. Its beautiful architecture and colorful houses proved again than Mexican cities won’t disappoint. I lost count of the beautiful cities we’ve visited in Mexico and there are a lot more that we didn’t get a chance to visit.
Our luck with the camp spots in Yucatan was great too. We had a nice stay next to a beautiful pool under the trees in a quiet area of Campeche and explored the city from there.
From Campeche, we had to head south toward Guatemala again. We had two options, heading south and east toward Bacalar in Mexico and Belize border or continue south and west toward the Guatemalan border which we already crossed once before. The weather on the eastern coast around Bacalar and Belize wasn’t still great and we didn’t have enough time to wait for it to improve, so we decided to head toward the same border that we used few weeks back when we first crossed into Guatemala from Mexico. We had a beautiful drive on the western coastline of the Yucatan peninsula heading south visiting beautiful towns and beaches like Champoton and Sabancuy along the way.
We had our last micheladas in an interesting bar in the middle of nowhere with interesting decoration (See below) and headed to the same camp spot that we stayed at before our first crossing into Guatemala. As we were sipping our last micheladas we were reflecting on our time in Mexico and our ups and downs and sweet and bitter memories that mexico offered us. Mainland Mexico is not an ideal place for overlanding or driving in general but we were so happy that we could experience it. Overlanding Mexico gave us the opportunity to see off the beaten path in Mexico and feel it in a way that we wouldn’t if we were travelling Mexico any other way. We will miss Mexico but I’m not sure if we want to drive it again 🙂
In the next post, we’ll cross back into Guatemala to meet our shipping deadline. It should be straightforward, right? Let’s see how it goes in the next post.
Till then take care and have fun.
